Another Month, Another Movie

So, we officially hit the 11 month mark over the weekend. And yes, I bought another Disney movie - The Little Mermaid this time. I like Sebastian the crab. :) It's hard to think that at this time last year I was running around getting all of our paperwork finished (we actually sent the paperwork on March 28 last year), and that at this time next year we still might not have our baby home. Sigh...

An update on our quilt...I've had several failed attempts to sign up for a learn-to-quilt class (really...these people don't seem to want my money...). But I met a lovely woman in line at the fabric store who took 10 minutes or so to draw out exactly what I need to do to complete the quilt. Really. I feel bad that I didn't even get her name. So with her directions and a book from the library, I am feeling somewhat confident that I can do this. I bought some cute "practice" fabric, and am planning on making a small practice quilt with it over spring break. Hopefully I can really do this myself...otherwise, I will have to start begging these quilt people to actually teach me! So...if you haven't sent a square yet, it's not too late. I really would love some more squares...we're very close to 100!

Other than being bummed out about the wait, we're doing well. Softball is starting soon - we have our first practice this weekend, and games start on April 22. I had coffee last week with a friend I met on an adoption board (how fun is that!), and we also attended our first "waiting parent" meeting from the local FCC (families with children from China) chapter. And in less than 2 weeks we'll celebrate my birthday at Opening Day for the Nats! Hooray baseball! :)

The Next Batch of Referrals Has Landed!

Happy March! So, the good news is that the next batch of referrals has landed. The bad news? Oh dear...where to start? First, it appears that the "official" cut-off date is October 24, 2005. (remember our LID is April 17, 2006) This means that they only got through 11 days of LIDs this month. It seems on the surface that it is a slight slowdown, though word is that October and November had a huge number of dossiers, so it may just be holding steady. No one knows for sure.

Speaking of things that no one knows for sure - there's a reason that I said this is the "official" cut-off date. When the CCAA announced their new rules a few months ago, one of the other things they announced was that agencies would now have to pay to receive cut-off information. Yes, you read that right. So it appears that this month is the first that they are not updating the information on their website; only on a private website that agencies who pay for the access can see. It doesn't appear that our agency either is paying for this or is sharing the information. The speculation on a lot of adoption sites was that the smaller agencies wouldn't subscribe; this now appears to be the case.

**update on 3/7 - the CCAA did update their website last night - referrals through 10/24/05. They also updated the review room - they've reviewed through 3/31/06...we're getting closer on review at least!**

The other strange thing with this is that even though the cut-off date is October 24, there are agencies who received referrals for a few days past the 24th. Again, there is a lot of speculation about this. Some think that these "surprise" referrals were for families whose LID was wrong (i.e., they were told their LID was 10/31, but it was actually 10/24). Some think that the CCAA might be starting to process further than the cut-off date for some agencies (for whatever reasons...there are about a million floating around there).

So I know that the bottom line is, "what does this mean for us?". I wish I knew. I know that we are definitely going to need to re-do our paperwork with USCIS & our homestudy. It's a pain both with the time it will take and the cost of re-doing it all. And my best guess is that we could be looking at this time next year before we get to travel to China. Crazy, I know. It's beyond frustrating. But I had the most wonderful conversation last week with my friend Carmen, who adopted both of her children. She reminded me that even though the wait STINKS, I'm not just waiting for any child - I'm waiting for MY child. And I think I can wait another year for that. :)